Germany new year assault cases rises

German police have broken up demonstrations of the anti-immigrant Pegida supporters and right-wing extremists after they clashed with police on Saturday in the western German city of Cologne.

Migrants who commit crimes should lose their right to asylum, German chancellor Angela Merkel said on Saturday, toughening her tone as crowds gathered in Cologne angered by mass assaults on women on New Year’s Eve.

Merkel also reiterated her earlier pledge to “reduce” the overall number of migrants – Germany saw more than 1.1 million newcomers arrive past year, far more than any other nation in Europe – but she did not offer any new plan.

Cologne’s chief of police was sacked for his handling of the incidents amid claims officers covered up the involvement of large groups of migrants. “What are women worth in this society?” she said, referring to Henriette Reker, who is mayor of Cologne, and who was stabbed in the neck last October by a man with a far-right background.

Thirty-one people, a lot of them North African or Middle Eastern countries, have been charged in the attacks.

Cologne police which has around 100 investigators scanning some 350 hours of video says it has identified 16 suspects.

“Where were you on New Year’s Eve?” one protester yelled at police, CNN reports.

The heated protest was held in the Cologne railway station area that was the scene of the New Year’s Eve assaults, at which witnesses described the perpetrators as people of “North African or Arab” appearance.

Johan Bruun, police spokesman, said two men, both asylum seekers, have been told via interpreter that they are suspected of committing sexual assaults.

“If a refugee flouts the rules, then there must be consequences, that means that they can lose their residence right here regardless of whether they have a suspended sentence or a prison sentence”, she said after a meeting with the top ranks of her party in the southwestern city of Mainz. Several officers and a freelance journalist were injured, police said, although the extent of their injuries remains unknown.

Merkel’s tougher stance reflects growing public resentment about the rising number of crimes committed by migrants in Cologne, Hamburg, Stuttgart, Frankfurt, Dusseldorf and Bielefeld.

The New Year’s crowd, at least 1,000 strong, massively outnumbered the police on patrol in the square, leaving cops helpless to counter at least two rapes and other brutal attacks from those who allegedly burned women with firecrackers, reached under their skirts to grope them, grabbed their breasts, tore off their undergarments, and screamed obscenities.

“If the law does not suffice, then the law must be changed”, she said, pledging action to protect not just German citizens, but innocent refugees too. “Most are asylum seekers or people living illegally in Germany. It is unacceptable for PEGIDA to exploit this awful sexual violence perpetrated here on New Year’s day and to spread their racist nonsense”, said Emily Michels, 28.

Despite the turmoil unfolding in Germany, UN Special Representative for Migration, Peter Sutherland, has backed the German Chancellor, Merkel, whose career is now being defined by her audacious migrant policy. “We are against all violence against women”, said protest organiser Martina Schumeckers, 57, a musician.